Ranma's Poem
by Ranmano1fan
Summary: Another songfic by me. This one is based on What Hurts the Most by Rascal Flatts. Please read and review. Thank you, enjoy.


**Ranma 1/2 Songfic**: Ranma's Poem

By: Ranmano1fan

Disclaimer: I do not own Ranma 1/2, it's characters or the song portrayed in this story. They are the rightful property of their respectful owners. I am only borrowing them for the time being and will return them when I am done. Enjoy and please leave a review if you wish.

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Their relationship was over. Akane was sick and tired of Ranma's inability to decide which of his fiancees he was finally going to choose to be with. Her logic was that since he and his no good excuse for a father were living in her house; and rent-free to boot; that the natural choice would be her. But every time Ranma was put into a position to settle all the chaos with those other girls, he would avoid answering them anyway he could and at all costs. The tipping point came after the failed wedding. It wasn't so much that the other suitors, both male and female, ruined the occasion as much as it was Ranma's lack of effort to get rid of them before they had a chance to spoil the ceremony. 

Even though it looked like after the event the boy had made a decision, the other girls would not accept it. The three of them continued to persistently come between Akane's relationship with him, showing up when he was alone and forcing themselves on him. Only to have her find them in that position, which were their intentions, for Akane to see that Ranma didn't want to be with her. And to top it off, the boy; try as he might; didn't look like he was trying hard enough to separate himself from them each time it occurred. So she took it upon herself to make the most important decision.

Four months after the disaster of a wedding and of him dodging the big question, Akane decided enough was enough. One day while Ranma and his father were sparring around the koi pond, the youngest Tendo gathered all of the boy's things, shoved them into a box and walked out the front door. Both father and son saw her walking with the box in her hands and after kicking his father into the pond, Ranma immediately joined her. He asked what was in the box, but she wouldn't answer him. Outside the gate, the girl dropped the box down onto the curb. The boy knelt down and opened it.

He said, "Hey, this is all my stuff. What's goin' on, Akane?"

He stood up again waiting for her to say something.

Her face was pointed down and her hair obscured her eyes as she said only two words to him: "Get out."

"'Get out'?" he repeated, "Whadda mean 'get out'?"

She screamed, "Go away! Leave! Understand yet?! Get the hell out!"

Her yelling attracted both father's attention.

"But..." started the stunned boy, but Akane cut him off, "Either leave on your own or they'll have to cart you away on a stretcher."

Ranma has seen her angry before, but nothing like this. The harsh, coldness of her voice, her unwillingness to look up into his eyes, it started to hurt him inside like she stabbed him in the stomach.

"Why?" he asked.

"'Why?'? 'Why?'! You want to know why? Fine! You won't make a choice so I am! If you want to be with me, okay, but you could at least not let the other girls feel like they have a chance!" she yelled.

"It's not like I ask them to jump me, ya know!" he yelled back, trying to defend himself.

Then Akane's anger reached it's peak. "Time to make up your mind, Ranma," she started, her voice cold and void of emotion, she had stopped yelling as well, "Me or them?"

"I...uh...well...um..." stuttered the boy, turning his eyes downward.

The girl let out a sigh, it was just like all the other times. "Go away. Go away and take your stupid father with you!" she shouted, turning around.

Both fathers were standing there on the sidewalk watching the argument unfold.

Ranma reached out and grabbed her shoulder, "Akane..."

Her voice was cold and low again, "Don't touch me." She then turned around again and still had that hard tone of voice as she looked at him with tears flowing down her ivory-skinned face, "After everything we've been through, you still can't bring yourself to answer that question. Go and don't bother coming back." She turned on her heel and walked thru the gate with her father behind her, trying to argue with her.

About a minute after she left and after Ranma dropped his head in disgust with himself, he heard Akane scream, "I will not give him another chance! He's had enough of them already! If he can't say he loves me, then good riddance!" and then he heard the slamming of their front door.

The boy blinked, steeled himself and marched right thru the gate and up to the front door and with Soun still on the porch, Ranma shouted at the door, "Akane!"

But he got no answer. "Akane, I..." he started, softening his approach.

The door swung open and the next thing he knew he had stars in front of his eyes and he was sitting on the stone pathway and his face hurt. She had punched him with enough force to knock down an elephant.

"I said not to come back! Try again and I'll do more than plant you on your butt, Ranma!" she yelled, slamming the door again.

The boy stood up and stayed rooted to the spot, staring at the door and getting angry.

"Don't worry, Ranma. I'll try talking to her," said Soun, trying to comfort the teenager.

"Don't bother," snapped Ranma, his tone hard, "It's not I could love a violent chick like her!" directing the comment towards the door, "Maybe I would be better with one of the other girls!"

Then he stomped away, grabbed his things from the curb and with his panda-father holding a sign that said, 'Come back,' and following not too far behind, the Saotome's left.

But what Ranma didn't know was that Akane had her back to the door with her sisters looking on. The girl was kneeling on the floor, crying when she heard him shout. 'Ranma , you idiot,' she thought. She then sprinted up to her room and tightly locked her door.

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The following week Ranma stayed absent from school. His classmates were worried something happened to him, since Akane was there and he wasn't.

In her anger, the girl thought, 'He's probably over at the amazon bimbo's place having a great time.'

Her friends and classmates asked her if she knew where Ranma was and she'd tell them, "I couldn't care less where that jerk went!"

The first two days she half-expected him to be at her house when she got there to say he was sorry, but he never showed up. That only made her more angry at him. And each subsequent day her expectations grew less and less and was completely gone by Friday. When she came home that day, there was a note taped to the front door. She could tell it was from Ranma because of his sloppy handwriting. She took the note off with a growl, mad at him for not being man enough to be there in person. Then after entering the house, she marched straight up to her room and tossed the note onto her desk without bothering to open it. There it sat for two days, but every time Akane was in her room she'd look over at it with curious glances. She even picked it up once, only to throw it back down again. She didn't want to read some lame excuse from him explaining his actions.

Long before dinner on Sunday, Akane was in her room trying to do the homework she needed for tomorrow. But it proved to be difficult. Every five minutes she would look over at the unopened note sitting next to the framed picture of her and Ranma surrounded by their friends that he made for her for Christmas and each time the curiosity grew. Until she finally gave up on the homework and turned her attention to the note. She picked it up and looked at it as it laid there in her hand.

She sighed and thought, 'Might as well get it over with,' and then she opened it. She started reading and realized it was a poem.

_I can take the rain on the roof of this empty house  
That don't bother me  
I can take a few tears now and then and just let them out  
I'm not afraid to cry every once in a while  
Even though going on with you gone still upsets me  
There are days every now and again I pretend I'm ok  
But that's not what gets me_

_What hurts the most  
Was being so close  
And having so much to say  
And watching you walk away  
And never knowing  
What could have been  
And not seeing that loving you  
Is what I was tryin' to do_

_It's hard to deal with the pain of losing you everywhere I go  
But I'm doin' It  
It's hard to force that smile when I see our old friends and I'm alone  
Still Harder  
Getting up, getting dressed, livin' with this regret  
But I know if I could do it over  
I would trade give away all the words that I saved in my heart  
That I left unspoken_

As she got to the end, her eyes began to fill with tears. They started to fall from her face, dampening the piece of paper as she reread the second verse.

_What hurts the most  
Is being so close  
And having so much to say  
And watching you walk away  
And never knowing  
What could have been  
And not seeing that loving you  
Is what I was trying to do_

She read it again, tears still going strong, trying to understand what it was he was telling her.

_What hurts the most  
Is being so close  
And having so much to say  
And watching you walk away  
And never knowing  
What could have been  
And not seeing that loving you  
Is what I was trying to do_

Then as she looked up, she noticed there were two more lines at the very bottom of the tear-stained poem.

_Not seeing that loving you  
That's what I was trying to do_

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Ranma sat in the living room of his home with his father there with him and his mother in the kitchen preparing dinner.

"Go apologize," said Genma, giving his son an order.

The boy sighed. Everyday for the last week the old man would say the same two words whenever they were alone.

"No, Pop. Why should I apologize when I didn't do anything! If anything, she should apologize to me for screaming at me!" he shouted, glaring at his father.

The look scared the man so badly, Genma quickly dumped a nearby bucket of cold water on himself, turning him into a panda again, then he curled up with a beach ball that was also nearby and held up a sign that said, 'Don't get mad at me, I'm just a cuddly widdle panda.'

"Pathetic, Pop, purely pathetic," replied Ranma, rolling his eyes.

Suddenly there was a knock on the door.

"I'll get it!" said the boy, anything to escape from his father.

Opening the door, he said, "Yes? Oh... Akane, it's you."

There she stood in her street clothes with her head down and her hands folded out in front of her.

The boy asked, "Akane, what are you doing here?"

Without warning, she leapt at him, wrapping her arms around his neck and tackling to the ground and she landed on top.

"Akane!" he yelled as he fell.

She buried her face into his chest and sobbed, "I'm sorry."

"Wha?" said Ranma.

"I'm sorry for not believing you wanted to be with me," she apologized.

"Huh? Whadda mean?" he asked, confused.

Akane lifted her head until it was level with his, their noses touching, and said, "This, silly."

Then the next moment she was kissing him. At first it came as a surprise to him, but just as fast he wrapped his arms around her and kissed her back.

Pulling away, she told him, "I read your poem."

"You did, huh?" he replied.

"Why couldn't you just say those things?" she asked.

"You know me. I'm terrible at things like that," answered Ranma, shrugging.

Giggling, she agreed sheepishly, "Yeah, me too."

They gazed into each other's eyes for the longest second they could remember.

Then Akane said, "Say it. Please, say it one time for me."

Smiling, he replied, "Akane, I love you."

Smiling back, she responded, "And I love you too, Ranma." and the two of them kissed again.

Standing off to the side was the boy's parents, Genma; now damp from the hot water used to change him back; holding his wife, Nodoka with one arm as the two adults beamed at the sight of their son and his fiancee showing their love for each other. And just like that, the two teenagers were back together again.

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The End 

Note: I heard this song around the same time I heard the song used in my last songfic, Sake Lullaby. Both songs use the same premise, but with different outcomes, so the stories would be the same, but would end differently.

I do hope you enjoyed this and will leave a review expressing how much you liked or didn't like this story. Thank you.


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